May Day May Day—yoo hoo!

Friday, May 1 

is the opening day of the 

Dolly Diva Design Boutique!

    How fun is that!!! I have a whole plan planned it is as follows:

        Although I will be keeping a doll or two or six for myself, all the other dollies will be looking for new adventures and new horizons. They will be wanting to take their wardrobes with them, of course.

     Okay, here's what you do if you are looking for something in particular and want to get in touch with me other ways than writing to the blog. You can send me an email at 'ladymacregor at gmail dot com'. However, I only go there once or twice a day so please be patient. Of course you can leave a message in the comment section at the bottom of this post but that's pretty public. Just write to me at the email above and I'll get it. I'm also on several doll lists. However, if you write to the blog and ask that your comment be kept private, I'll do exactly that. 

      

(By the way, I need a replacement body for Madra. I will trade a reasonable trade for anyone who has one, we eat our own shipping costs.) 

Here follows a list of stuff I have my hands on right now:

    • Kentucky Derby Gene dressed in a green silk outfit w/ hat, gloves, purse, stockings and field glasses.

    •  2 horses w/saddles, saddle blankets, and so on, 1 trophy, 1 rose blanket, 1 bouquet (maybe two but not sure yet) of roses.

    •  Gene's racing silks, cap and boots.   

    •  Lots of paper things like cards with the horses in the races listed, etc. that are miniaturized copies of the real things!

    •  All my Trents except one­—the one in a tux—so he’ll have to go to other “studios” to find work! One of him has, wait for it, "flocking" hair!

    •  Ms. Gene, is tied down in her hatbox unscathed, though the hatbox was well and truly trashed by UPS on its way to me from the convention (which I couldn’t attend!)  {:(  I have made a sort of repair job with scotch tape. Anyone with patience and skill could repair it nicely and neatly should they so desire. It is only apart at the seams.  I don’t have the time to do the repairs myself. There will be no charge for the hatbox except if it is a couple bucks more for the shipping.

The Dallas Gene painted by Brian Bulkley 

• The Dallas Gene gift doll with a short, curly Gina Lolobrigida type "do" in a slinky white mermaid dress with red lined cloak (below), MIB only opened to look at and never seeing the light of day since Dallas 2006. 


 I am graduat-ing now from the 16ish" ladies to the American Model Goth, 2012 version. I've finally found The One. She is the perfect size for what I want to do—which I have explained a little while ago on this blog—which is to miniaturize my concert gowns.    
     Here’s where you come in! To do all of the stuff I really want to do dollwise and otherwise, I need the space I currently have filled with all manner of dolly stuff I no longer can't or don't want to use. You get to see if there's something you want, get it/her/him and play with same so that the ladies who live here now don't pine away in their boxes—or make such an infernal racket with their demands I can't think—which will free me to do all my other stuff not to mention the space to do it in, but I will be sewing for those few dolls I have left and making patterns and like that. One big slightly worn concert dress can make many mini-dresses. See where I’m going with this?
      Now that you know how I plan to spend the second half  of my life—means living to age 154—you see why I am forced to make more room available while enjoying myself in the process. 
     Okay. Done. Stay tuned. I’m off to the doll mines! See you Friday, May 1 anytime after 9:00 a.m. Pacific Standard Time?I will be setting up a non-google site for myself—have the site but haven't developed it or anything. That's my next project. So for now, working through "Dolls For Sale", "Dress Making for Dolls", the old "HLAYG", or other sites. Just look me up on those sites and contact me there.

     See you soon!

Wondering....

about you all—you there in your dollroom, and you other yous, too, wherever you may be! I'm wondering where you are, what you do in the doll-o-sphere, how you found your way here. Basically, I'm just interested in who I'm talking to. Am I just talking to me or are you reader types stumbling onto the site, giving it the once-over and then coming back once in a while to see if I've uploaded something "dolly diva" like—a pattern or design, or at least an accessory like a hat or purse, etc. etc. etc.
     Well, things are looking up. I'm reaming out my STUFF. I have a lot of that. I've been collecting some of the it since I was a teenager, some time last century, she says with a mysterious smile. 
     I don't have any grandkids. I don't even have any kids. My husband's kids aren't in any way, shape or form, interested in the mini-ladies I find so intriguing. Now there you have it. There's no place for these little women to go but to interested parties out in the blogosphere.
     So, tell me in the comments who and where you are and what you find intriquing about dolls. I will tell you that my dolly interest is fashion oriented. I'm a frustrated dress/hat designer and I love the 1930s/1940s especially. My interest dwindles the closer we get to modern day. The twenties (1920s that is) are interesting and easy to sew with no real fitting required, but they aren't as beautiful as the thirties, forties and fifties. People dressed then, you know? Suits, hats, heels, cocktail dresses, evening gowns, and bathing suits with more material than necessary just to keep their wearers legally clothed!
     Don't we love Gene Marshall et alia for this very reason? She has dressy dresses and suity suits gowny gowns and acres of glamour.
     Also, I have another reason for starting this whole blog and for beginning to collect Gene and her buddies in the first place. Let me say that Barbie is just too tiny for my purposes. 'Nuff said.
     When 15.5" Gene, friends and copycats showed up on the scene, I did a little leap of joy—and bought a whole tribe over the years. However, my purpose did not come to fruition because I was involved in learning the ropes of being married for the first time at age 61! Sidebar: I made my wedding gown, of course.
     Then what do you suppose! Tonner made the 22" American Model Goth in 2012. She is superb, glam to the max, gorgeous and, most important to me, BIG!!!
     Now I get to it—my purpose: I may have mentioned this before, but I am a retired opera/concert singer. Over my years of performing, I wore a lot of concert gowns which I made myself! The opera companies supplied my opera costumes. However, I have plans to make mini-copies of my Valkyrie and Rhinemaiden costumes from the originals of the first Wagner Ring Cycle put on by Seattle Opera. When the company retired the first production, they gave me my costumes. I plan to make a flock (herd?) of eight Valkyries, complete with American Girl horses for five mounted ladies, of which I will only keep Siegrune/Waltraute (my roles) and a trio of Rhinemaidens of which I will keep Wellgunde (yep, me!). The rest go on the block.     
   Glitzy material that looked good in the light and my friends the Vogue pattern people kept me supplied with gowns (way-less-expensive-than-buying-readymade), which could look spectacular from the audience and actually fit me. I'm 5'10" and long-waisted with broad shoulders (for a girl anyway). In strapless readymade gowns, I look like I'm wearing an empire-waisted short formal, sort of like preparing to go to the prom.
     They are now packed away in trunks. I don't have room for trunks. Plus they are never seen in those trunks. They lie amouldering in those trunks. Solution: Make mini-copies for my beautiful AM Goth girl and put them on display! And speaking of my AM Goth girl, she's going to be my one and only with a plainer sister for fitting, etc. 
     I will keep a representative assortment, one of each, of the other girls I've collected but most of the girls and their clothes will be out there for you, my loyal follower(s?) to snap up without the interference and bother of eBay. Sound interesting?
     BUT...Oh what to do with the patterns made for those mini-copies? Oh what to do with all the leftover glitzy material from the big dresses? MAKE COPIES OF THE PATTERNS and MAKE MORE COPIES OF THE MINI-DRESSES FOR PEOPLE WHO DON'T LIKE TO SEW!! Put those copies out where people who might want such types of clothes for their fashion dolls of all shapes and sizes can get them—a glamour shop for the ladies, and maybe even a tux or two for the guys they hang with. And because patterns are easy to replicate, they will be the most prevalent of things available on the site. 

     How does this sound to y'all? Are you beginning to figure out why this blog is called "Dolly Diva Designs" hmmmm? 

Cover Photo by Dave DeCaro   

   I'm going to give you a little teaser here!  The publication, left, measures 8.5" x 11.5" and contains 30 pages of articles, stories and pictures, most in color, put together by yours truly but with articles and photos donated by members of the "Here's Looking At You, Gene" yahoo mail group. It was prepared for Gene's 2010 convention in Philadelphia, which turned out to be the Integrity Toys Gene's farewell. The centerfold of the magazine was a pattern for the sweet little sundress with bolero, seen below. 

Sister Mary Joseph Doll Patterns

If you would like a magazine for yourself, I will answer questions and settle details via ladymacregor at gmail dot com. At the convention, the magazine sold for $25. The price for it from this blog, including postage in the US would be $12.50. Outside the US, the price would be $12.50 plus any postage in excess of the equivalent of $2.50 US.

That's all for now—but do keep your needles threaded

and your dolly models standing by...

Okay, I did finish my "novel" — that is, I completed the 50,000 word minimum required to "win" (everyone who did the minimum at least is a "winner")—I did that plus some 3,000 more! I am still amazed. But the thing is not much more than just that: a bunch of words run together with a story embedded therein. Somewhere. I think. It is a VERY ROUGH draft. But it is a beginning. It will be a long slog to finish it. Then polish it. Then revise it. Then polish it again. Then... and like that. There is a winner banner and a winner button (see above) that I am entitled to use to prove I attempted and then completed this amazing feat (for me) of concentrated writing (and that's all it signifies, by the way, so don't be impressed—yet!). At least my husband likes my story enough to be enthusiastic about it. I think he was shocked that I actually stuck to it and did it! This may suprise you all as well, but I often take a great long time to finish what I start...I know you might find that hard to believe....heh heh....five plus years to get a blog underway and still not fulfilling its stated purpose!

As I work on the "novel", I'll have to take a lot of Dolly Breaks! (Shocking fact: I do not drink coffee. I am a Tea-Totaller! So it's a Dolly or Tea I'll be Breaking with...see?) 

Anyway, now that I have done the month of November attempting to begin to start to become a novelist I will dub the month of December as Dolly Diva Design Month. Note the alliteration? It's a sign! It will happen. Just like I did all 50,000+ words. I hope. We'll get this show on the road, or sink beneath the flood of boxes of dollies struggling to be free. I will do dolls to rest my brain from all that word-smithing. So coming up? DoDiDeMo! Get it? Great! Right?

Check back here now and then and if you're on any fashion doll e-mail list, check in there now and then as well. Stand by, cross your fingers and let's see what happens!

DoDiDeMo, here we come!....

Now that it has been firmly established...

that I am NOT a novelist, I am back to the serious subject of this blog: Dolly Diva Design. That is, providing designs for the miniature divas so that their insatiable desire for wonderful gowns, chic suits, elegant cocktail dresses, glamourous casual outfits, attractive sport clothes and like that, which they have been less than patiently awaiting since this blog was begun and for which it came into being in the first place. 

I will venture, once more, to predict that this true purpose is not as far in the offing as those who have patiently, or even impatiently or possibly feel it is in vain they have waited for the actualization of this event to occur.  

I am not promising anything, remember, until I have real and present articles of clothing to offer for the wee women and, in some cases, the wee women themselves, with pictorial proof of same appearing somewhere in your immediate vicinity, dear readers. Keeping that fact firmly in mind, here is a bit of information you might find of interest. The first things slated for offer here will be the outfits in which many of the ladies—some with said ladies actually in them, if anyone so desires—came clothed from their point of manufacture. 

I have entirely too many of these creatures to be able to take care of them all in the manner to which they are entitled, not to mention which they demand. They have not failed to remind me of this in a constant and consistant, though silent, remonstrance daily, nay, hourly as they stand about or, worse yet, languish in their boxes, worse still, in my closets or—horror, woe—the garage, even though they are carefully wrapped and protected from any dust or other dangers. Many of them have never even seen the light of day. Those are the ones that are hoarse from constant yelling at me about something something neglected something something unfair and like that.

So, not writing novels a done deal, I am at last prepared to begin to start to put together this blog as a source of supply for your current fashion mini-divas, and for filling in holes in your collections of original clothing or special convention outfits, accessories and clothed dolls of the past say, fifteen or so years, such as  Gene Marshall, Madra Lord, or Violet Waters, for example, and others more recently arrived on the scene. The Tonner ladies are also in the lineup in various outfits, a couple of which are Thèatre de la Mode numbers, for example. Then there is the amazingly posable and adorable Vita and company with a whole new vista opening before us—not to mention a whole new list of wants and must haves. Sigh. All that is needed is to bring them forth, fluff up their hairdos and steam their outfits and they will be ready for presentation. If they have never left their boxes, they will have to remain as is until they reach their new homes. 

The month of December will be spent cataloging, preping and photographing these ladies—or at least the ones who are thoroughly disgusted with me and insist on departing for other locales. They long for the limelight and public display where they will be appreciated properly and not kept in some dark and confining BOX, for heaven's sake, but put out where they can be admired—and catered to, please.

So, things are looking up here at Dolly Diva Designs, now that the only things remotely "novel" will be putting these ladies out where they can be given proper attention and provided with the numberless items with which they can be adorned and in which their beauty and charm can be properly displayed. 

Stay tuned!

So, Summer's almost gone...

but I'm working, working, working and by cracky, I think I'm beginning to see the spaces opening up! On Sunday last, I tried to put up my work surface—6' x 28" with hanging rods above and filing cabinets underneath—but only managed to bruise the top of my right hand and arm and barely escaped with my skull in one piece! 

     Never the less, the space is clear and as soon as I can find a proper ladder, or a carpenter (professional variety), I'll get that shelf installed good and proper and then lookout: THIS GIRL WILL BE UNSTOPPABLE (she says for the one hundred forty-seventh time)! 

      I've got my copier, printer, etc. combine set up and ready to go so I can copy and size patterns from the little Barbie-sized Genes and 14" Tonners et alia, through the regular Tylers and Genes as well as all their friends and relations to the big American Model gals without having to redraft. Just up or down the percentage! Cool? Oh yes. 

     I have to make some boy things also. Michael Jordan is just in his basketball togs. He must have some slacks, a sport coat and of course a dinner jacket and tux in order to be ready to ask the ladies to dinner and dancing. Clark Gable, decked out as Rhett Butler in white tie and tails, has to have a white dinner jacket and a planter's hat of course. He'll be escorting Miss Goth from Tonner since he's the only one that's even in the height ballpark for her.      

     Humphrey Bogart is hanging around and will need something a little more formal than his trench coat and fedora if he's to be seen with Miss Gene, star of stage and screen and the rest of the Hollywood girls. I guess Trent will have to look sharp if he's to rival the other guys at all. He may have chiseled features but he's no Clark Gable or Batman! I forgot about Batman. He needs something between the Bat Cape and his tux, doesn't he? 

   Cap'n Jack Sparrow is hanging around as well, to escort the girls to the odd masked ball or Halloween party. I won't try to redress him. He's a bit recalcitrant about haircuts and shaves and the like—and with his cutlass and pistol at the ready, I'm not going to insist on anything. Have you seen the shrunken head hanging from his belt? Gives me the shivers, he does.
     My new designs are coming along as well to join the ones I've already done from earlier on. Designs, however, are not yet patterns. That takes a bit of tedious draping and cutting and muslin fittings and so forth.

     I will want to get rid of about 3/4 of the 50 or so Genes et alia I have lounging about the premises. They complain all the time about not having anything to do or anywhere to go and that I'm always playing favorites. Violet and Madra, especially Madra, are very insistent about needing to go here and there. Violet has singing gigs to do, and Madra? She needs to be out there where the casting directors are so she can flaunt her stuff. Auditioning, of course, is out of the question with a star of her, uh, caliber...yes, that's it caliber!

     Vita and various other girls from other studios are hanging about but I haven't done much designing for them as they are still the new girls in town. No doubt as Gene, Madra and lovely Violet and others of their gang begin to change studios and some of the, uh, more experienced stars contemplate retirement, the other girls, especially Miss Goth, will take up more and more of my time. 

     So, my friends, stick around. Things are about to get interesting!

 

Well, folks, never say anything for sure...

You know the part where I said I'd be finished with the doll room at the end of May? Ha! How about bronchitis and coughing my brains out for the entire month. So there you are. Nothing is for certain, is it? Phooey. I was loaded for bear but couldn't shoot even a mouse. Fortunately, there are no mice in the hice...uh, I mean, there is no mouse in the house. 

But I am now recovered (enough, even, to sing a solo in church this Sunday) so check here to see what happens next. I'm not stating any statements or promising any promises from now on. 

I've been trying to put this thing together for...let's see, how long now...would you believe five years? Whoa! A way long time, no? Something always happens. I suppose I should think that maybe it isn't meant to be but that's not the way my mind works. Especially if I actually really truly want to do it. 

There is one outfit I'm especially anxious to miniaturize for Miss Goth. Soon I will celebrate my fifteenth wedding anniversary. For that interesting occasion fifteen years ago, I made my own dress with matching headdress! Miss G. even has a wig that matches my wedding hairdo. Too bad I don't have a face that matches hers!

Sorry, this was just supposed to be telling you all about the interruptions in my plans....again! Sigh. So therefore I'll stop this installment of the Saga of Dolly Diva Designs and hope to see you next time with some new news. 

Hello there...

Yes, it has been a long time since I last wrote. No, I am not yet ready to open "Dolly Diva Designs, the Shop". Yes, I still intend to do so at some point in my life...but since that life seems harder to get hold of than a puddle of mercury and more trouble to arrange than putting ants in a box, I'm having a bit of organizational difficulty. You see, my staff (that would be me) is still trying to dig out from under moving boxes (I know I've now lived in this house since June 19, 2012. Shut up!) full of, would you believe, fabric and dolls and doll accoutrements (I'm saying it in French, okay? I LIKE French).

BUT here's the deal: I am going to have it all put together by the end of May, and then....

We'll see what happens. 

I have decided that my dolly life now belongs to the Tonner Goth American Model of 2012(?), whichever was the first one—or at least the first one I noticed enough to have to buy. She's the really sexy one in the black lace undies. (I have to keep her out of my husband's line of sight to avoid drool stains.) But what is now the plan, you ask? To make her the doll for whom I make the copies of my concert gowns and the occasional opera costume, as well as for whom I will design original frocks (she, being the requesting patron, will decide what sort of frocks those will be out of which of the myriad fabrics we have in stock). I will be careful to make patterns for those frocks and adjust them for the 16"(± increments of inches) ladies, to make them available in pattern form for those who care to make them to their own standards of couture, haute or otherwise. I will also try to make a few dresses for the shorter ladies as well for those who don't really themselves relish the act of stitching up/keeping up with the wardrobe demands of their dollies.

I will be leaving hats, purses, gloves, and so on mostly to other providers, though I will essay the occasional accessory or set thereof when Ms. Goth decides to throw a fit because absolutely nothing she sees matches what is in her mind's eye. Sheesh. Sometimes, these girls... oh never mind.

Anyway, just thought I ought to keep in touch with my reader...er, readers. *smiles widely, bats eyelashes* So am doing so here. Once again, when the goods—at least the ones I've managed to pry temporarily out of the clutches of Ms. Goth—are in my hot little hands, they will be photographed, sketched out, or otherwise illustrated for your benefit and announced on the dolly pages. Until that utopian moment arrives, I will keep in touch here.

Bye all!

I'm Baaaaack...for a bit anyway!

My friends, I am beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel! I've actually begun to work on my doll/sewing/writing room. Is that amazing? Is that fantastic? Are the clouds clapping their hands in glee? So okay, probably not. But I am at least beginning to have some hope that I will see the floor again in here, perhaps e're this year ends even. Then we shall see what comes forth, shall we not? No, no. I am not promising dolly stuff. Not at all. Don't you remember? It will be when it IS. That is Cryptic for "when you see the picture in your e-mail on the dolly lists, then there will be actual stuff for sale right here on Dolly Diva Designs, which you can then purchase for ridiculous prices." I'm not saying which way ridiculous, mind you. It depends on how needy I am at the time! Or how much it cost me to make or put forth or otherwise procure said merchandise. But I do promise that I will entertain all offers as I want to get rid of some stuff around here. I do NOT want to die with all my toys. I want them to be scattered about across the land in good homes with responsible parents, you know?

Okay. What else has been happening around here? Well, I have written a piece of fiction. Can you imagine? ME? Fiction? Who woulda thought it? I do have a small amount of literary imagination. I have, for example, imagined that I would be deep in Merchandising Land by now, making and selling doll clothes, doll clothes patterns of my own design, thinning the mass of dollhood in my garage by offering the ladies for sale—NO! Not THAT way! They would be adopted by above mentioned responsible parents, etc. etc. etc., and be beautifully clothed. Also, there would be wonderful designs flowing from my pen and paintbrush, making them whine and pule to their new mothers—and fathers too, of course—about how if they really were loved and adored they would have lots more clothes like the ones on Shirley's blog, and like that. You know how they are, those doll girls. Always wanting this trinket, that outfit, those shoes, a couple handbags to match, hats, gloves, and on and on. Not to mention the occasional boyfriend with an extensive wardrobe of his, uh, their own. Let's not even mention the sports equipment they would need....

So I'm still dreaming. So maybe someday those dreams will come true. Keep looking, folks. You may soon be ... Now, Shirl. Do NOT get the hopes of these people, their dolls, and the rest of the civilized (and uncivilized too why not) world—where was I oh yeah—up! Remember? Picture on Doll List? 

Heh. Okay. See you guys later. I've got some work to do!

Tah!

I've got a new computer—so I'm happy again!

Now, with my refurbished 2010 model MacBook Pro, I have no reason not to write lots and often. Well, maybe I could use the excuse that I am setting up the Dolly Diva Design Boutique, right? Well, I suppose I could, if that were truly the actual truth. However, I am about to begin the beginning. I know, I know, time is flying by and perhaps I will be forced, once again, to put aside a few more days, nay, weeks to prepare for the Grand Opening. However, I do know now what I'll be doing with that extra time. With the brand new Gene recently introduced to the world, there may be a need for some very high class gowns for the lady. Therefore, I will be forced to produce at least one new creation. I was going to start by selling off the original Gene's things but in honor of the new Miss Marshall, I do think I will produce a new design to celebrate the occasion. 

Tax Day did sort of set me back a bit. It always takes much longer to do taxes, even with two of us working together, than I think it will. But now that's over for another year and I can get down to business.

So, with a (nearly) new computer and the coming of Spring, I am inspired to get this show on the road.

Ready? Set! Let's GO!!!

Hello, folks!

Sadly, it appears that my little laptop (Toshiba w/Windows 7 Home version) has bitten the dust on a permanent basis. It happened about 3 months ago but I was able to get it up and running by sacrificing everything on it! This time, being a learner (albeit a slow one), I put all my saving sort of things in a Dropbox so it didn't get lost. But sure enough, the Toshiba crashed again and this time refuses to respond at all. So now to make the decision: do I buy another Windows machine or return to my (much more expensive) first love—a Mac? I think it will be the Mac, expensive but more reliable. Besides I have three old G4s I can use as storage hard drives. They don't do Airport so I can't tie into the house wireless system without elaborate cables run from my computer area over hill and dale to my husband's server. Thus, I need a newer model. But I love Macs and have had them since my first in 1989 (gasp) until I had to have the wireless thing. Now, I will have my Macs and wireless too! In the meantime, I'm using the husband's machine. 

However, let's escape from the land of computer horrors to more interesting dolly-type things...

I am finally ready to put the doll room together. Are you amazed, readers mine? Well, you should be. It's, like, we needed another house to put our books in but we have finally got most of what we really don't need out of here and what we're keeping into the garage. A car? A car is supposed to fit in there? Who knew! Just kidding. This is California so we don't worry so much about cars in garages, at least not in our neighborhood! It's just a convenient, oversized junk room at our house which also happens to have a washer and dryer in it. But a car....? Not a chance! 

So far the books are in cardboard boxes but we envision shelves, to be much like our own personal library. Unfortunately, we will not be able to afford a librarian, though we probably would need two or even three! We both like books, you see, and I have several interests, dolls and vintage fashions (30s and 40s mostly), sewing, costume design, and like that. Then there are all the books on history and writing and art and music. That doesn't count the scores of scores (music, that is) which must find a home somewhere near enough to the piano so that I don't have to drive 10 miles to get what I need to learn for a gig, should one arise. All of the subjects require books, books, books and more books. I LOVE THEM. So does the husband and of course on different subjects so we don't share each other's books that much... You get the picture?

Oh wait. I did promise dolly talk. So I will invite anyone who wants to start a topic, ask me a question about the supposed boutique which has been promised for a couple of eons but which has yet to begin, or just talk about a pet project of your own, to make use of the comments section. I will be monitoring submissions so that we won't be inundated with spamish sorts of stuff and can stick to that in which we are truly interested, 'kay?

As for my own dolly stuff, I have told you that I am interested in making miniatures of my concert gowns. But I also have several Lutterloh sets from the late 30s and 40s which I want to try to make for my dolls. If I am successful, I will make copies of the patterns I use for the dolls and put them up for sale in the sewing section of the proposed boutique. I probably won't make more than one or two copies of the outfits themselves, as in sewing them—one for my doll of choice, the Tonner American Model Goth 2011, and one or two others  for Gene or Tyler to put in the boutique. 

What will go in the boutique first will be my excess Genes, Madras, and I think I'll even let my Violets go—at least one or two. Also, most of the clothes that came from Ashton Drake and a lot of the Integrity stuff as well will go into the boutique. I am more interested in my own designs, vintage stuff, and copies of my gowns than I am the original clothing that came on the dolls. I know they are lovely but one only has so much space one's life and abode, no? 

So my doll friends, do leave a note about what particular interest you have in these fashionable dolly divas...clothes, sewing, vintage stuff, design, what? I think a lot of us just still like to play with dolls. I know that's part of it for me. I didn't have dolls or toys much in evidence when I was a kid...too much bouncing about from pillar to post. Now I'd like to make up for that so when the larger ladies came to be, Gene et alia and then the American Model, I have stopped my searching and am ready to begin playing! And playing and playing and playing! 

The reason for the boutique is to share that play with other superannuated kids like me. If not now, when, eh?

Hope to hear from you all soon, okay?

Back again, better late than ...

write when I have nothing to say! 

So here I am at the (almost) beginning of a new year. My Gummers has not appeared and I am becoming used to life without his sweet presence. Not resigned to it yet, but at least used to it. So I will go directly into dolly mode now and stop public mourning. I don't know when, if ever, private mourning will dwindle to levels that will allow me to stop constantly missing him. But I really don't want to stop remembering his amazing little self. He is really the first of my many animals that has affected me this way. The closest to come to it was Henry, my first pet as an adult that did not belong to my family of origin! What a lovely cat he was. I lost him to illness at age seven, but by then I had other animals and it was necessary for his welfare to put him down. I could be with him till the end. It is difficult in the extreme to realize that the Gum died alone. My only comfort is to think it was instantaneous. So, you, dear Reader, will be spared my further grieving. Thanks for listening so long!

onward to the land of Dollydom:

I am now the proud owner of a couple of Urban Vitas, joining the lovely American Model 2011 Gothic, various and sundry 16" ladies from Tonner, and the ladies who started all this--my MANY Genes, Madras, and Violets. 

As for dudes, I recently got a very Clark Gable-esque Rhett Butler. He is 21" tall which is a tad too tall for my Tonner and Franklin Mint Scarletts while being an inch shorter than the Gothic beauty. However, I can put a 2-inch platform under him and stand him behind the American Model so that she will be shorter.  Also standing her in the foreground with him a few inches upstage would work as well. I'm thinking of photos here rather than display.

In addition to Rhett, I also have a Michael Jordan who is quite tall (not in proportion to his human height unfortunately but as tall as Rhett at least!) with a permanent outfit (shorts and shoes) painted on but so what. He can still wear a suit. I have the Tonner Batman set, dressed in his tux but provided with his Batman suit too and he also is taller than say my Basil, Brenda Starr's mystery man. I have as well an Effanbee Humphrey Bogart who is very short, shorter even than my one lonely Trent Osborne. 

At any rate, I am planning to design outfits for all these ladies. I don't know if I will be able to do any designing for the gentlemen. I'll leave that for others. I will probably be scaling patterns I already have for them. 

As the first order of business, I'm working on my dedicated doll room and have already changed my ideas about what will work best about 10 times. However, it has finally settled down as of last night with my best greatest last final idea yet. I think.

I'll keep you all posted.

Bye for now, Dollings!

I'm STILL NOT 

all the way moved in to my dolly den!

Sigh! It is taking more than a village to get this house put together. Did I mention that I'm never, ever moving again, long as I'm breathing? Well, I'm not. A moving company? Maybe. BUT I'M NOT!!!!

Okay. Got that out of my system. Now on to the fun stuff: Dolls and their accoutrements! Wheeeee!!!

I'm changing streams in the middle of my horses. No, really. I've been collecting the large Bataat horses, as I have mentioned before, in order to use them as Valkyrie mounts. I plan to make some doll outfits like the ones I have worn in the Seattle Wagner Ring Cycle (the first one, au Rackham) and make a flock of Valkyries out of some Jakks Pacific Teutonic (in looks anyway) maidens, with the impressive Bataat steeds for the mounted ladies to ride. In Die Walküre, the second opera of the four-opera cycle, there are five mounted warriors and three "groundlings" in the group, making eight warrior maids in total. So I have five of the horses and the eight maidens. However, I need one more horse because Brünnhilde has a horse as well, a white stallion named Grane. I have a white mare but hey, whose checking, um, details! Therefore, I need another regular colored horse for the fifth mounted Valk. And they are very big so the shipping is going to be the big expense there. Besides the one more horse, all I need is to make nine little Valkyrie outfits complete with spears, shields, the famous armor with hubcaps and helmets with wings or horns, i.e. whatever I can come up with! I have my original costume to use as a model and perhaps even the fabric, at least for the skirts. I'm sure this will be fun if I ever get started on it.

The Rhinemaidens will be a snap: swamp water green leotards and tights with all sorts of sparkly bits tacked on here and there, including their faces, hands and hair. There are only three of them after all! However, I'll need the new Itegrity Toys bodies or Vita bodies for them! The Vitas would work best because they have the ability to wear flats, meaning they can go barefoot! Not to mention they are able to pose in more come-hither positions.

 I'm hoping to get both groups done to sell during the summer festival season as mementos to those who like that sort of thing. Who knows what will happen? Maybe an opera company or two will buy one to auction off as a fund raiser.

My biggest happiness now is the 2011 Tonner American Model Basic Goth! I'm supposed to be a dedicated Gene fan...and I am! It's just that the AM is tall enough to be very easy to sew for—no itsy bitsy seams three stitches long but things that can be detailed without a magnifying glass and a microscopic needle!

Another big project—I know—but I just want to do it: As soon as I finish with the Valkyries and Rhinenixies, I'll start on the copies of my concert gowns for these big girls. One for me for my Goth girl out of the original dress, and then as many as I can squeeze out of the remaining fabric to put up for sale. I think the large ladies will be pleased for some stage-worthy finery. Think how it would look on the red carpets of their lives. Actually, I even have the red carpet, thanks to the Hollywood Gene Convention.

So you see, I've actually begun to think of this blog as a place to exhibit my wares. I should get started today! This morning! Okay, as soon as I finish my nap!

Hello, dolly...fans, that is!

I'm sort of moved in and now I have to set up the doll room. The stuff is all therein, but in boxes, bags and piles, with mitg -- more in the garage -- to be sorted, culled and transported to the doll room once I have the furniture put together and/or arranged. I have a large workbench/counter with shelf and what used to be a pot rack when it was in my kitchen, with a bar stool sort of chair that turned it into an eating area when I had a piano and teaching area in the living room and no place for a table! To get it out of the room at the old place, into the truck and out again, then into the new house and doll room, I had to take it all apart. Now two of the support pieces have gotten buried somewhere and I have to wait till I find them to put the whole thing back together again. Hope it doesn't turn out to be another Humpty Dumpty!

But I now have the desk with my computer, several of my bookcases and lots of my doll and fashion books, not to mention the Vogue magazine collection (one issue from each year with a three at the end of it, i.e. 1913, 1923, etc. up till I get the issue for next year: 2013.  I wonder if the magazine and I will be around for 2023!  Someday, I will try to scan all the covers and post them here. There are ten of them now (not counting the several extra ones from my favorite fashion years, the 1940s) with one more when I choose the 2013 issue. I buy the ones I like and then make the selection at the end of the year.

They are such fun to look through and read. I was born in 1938 so I have always wondered why I wasn't drawn to the "X8" years but the way it started was I discovered an old 1953 issue in my stuff when I went back home to go to work for the Panama Canal Company in 1963. I had bought an issue that had a lovely photo of Jean Shrimpton, a very popular model at the time, on the front and the 10-year-old issue I found had such a different feel to the cover that I saved them both for the interesting contrast only 10 years could make in the culture of the country, let alone fashion and even more important, the status of women. Then I kept an issue from 1973 which was another wild shift, and then, after the one from 1983, I just kept on going.

When the internet showed up and eBay was born, I realized I could go backwards in my collection as well as forward. So I filled in 1943, 1933, 1923, and finally all the way back to 1913. I think there was a 1903 issue, but I couldn't afford that year...it is sold as an antique at the going prices of rare books. Not in my particular bank account league!

I promise to share soon!

I Miss GLAMOUR!

I miss dressing up to go out. I miss wearing hats. I miss feeling elegant. I wear jeans, shirts, sometimes t-shirts (though a few are raw silk)—but I miss glamour, I miss elegance. I live in California where even in sophisticated San Francisco, with all their society doings, they are not really glamorous. They are sexy, yes. They are coifed, yes. They are made up, yes. But the air about them is not glamorous. Nor is glamour extant these days in Hollywood. No languid drapery. No elegant wraps. No graceful poses. No.

Even the many models on runways have no glamour. The clothes they wear are not meant to enhance the women they bedeck. They are meant to make a statement, not about the wearer, but about the designer.

I want to see glamour. I want to wear glamour. I want to feel glamour. I want to champion glamour.

I think our society began to die when we no longer cared about ourselves enough to take time and care with our inner selves—nor respected our outer selves enough and those outer selves with whom we came in contact—to dress well on a consistent basis. I don't speak only of women. I speak of men as well. Men look wonderful in suits. Why are they so averse to wearing them?

If we all dressed well, with a little glamour even by day, and were less instantly familiar, less constantly casual, dressing as though we cared about presenting a pleasing exterior to the rest of the world, a sort of walking neighborhood improvement project, we might address the stranger we talk to on the phone, as someone shocked me this evening by doing, as Ms. X. or Mr. Y., instead of Sue or Bob. We might even begin to respect each other enough not to destroy each others' property, each others' egos, each others' lives, each others' souls, not just here but everywhere.

We love the little 16" bits of glamour. Why don't we emulate them?